For You, I Wait

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I remember that day, when they took you away, but you promised to always return,

You said, “Light this candle, bear what you can handle, I’ll be back before its last burn.”

Layers of soot cover every square foot of the walls that witnessed our passion,

The flame fell weaker, hopes dimmed bleaker, and memories of you turned ashen.

Unwilling to settle, I replaced its pedestal, and gave all suitors my refusal,

Wax bled to the floor, survived both World Wars, but we smolder to dust at your funeral.

I‘m so grateful that you took the time to read my piece for this week’s Friday Fictioneers, hosted by the radiant Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. With ninety-one words, I felt the best way to tell this story was through poetry. I truly hope you enjoyed my piece, as I warily crept beyond my comfort zone to write it. If you find the time, give the other fictioneers a good read. You’d be amazed at the variety of stories that branch from each prompt!

 

 

 

62 thoughts on “For You, I Wait”

    • Thank you so much, Bjorn, for reading and leaving such a thoughtful and reflective comment. You expressed the devastation war leaves so eloquently. In fact, I believe your comment put my entire poem to shame. Thanks, again!

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  3. I don’t follow many blogs that aren’t humor based, but have yet to regret when your posts break up that trend. If only I could…

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    • Hi, Helen! I appreciate you reading and the thoughtful comment! I don’t mind the “bear” suggestion. Every time I revised it before publishing, I kept thinking it should be “bare,” but I finally consulted a dictionary, and in the verb usage of “to accept or endure” “bear” is the correct term. It seems odd to me, but I decided to trust Merriam Webster with this one! Nonetheless, I truly appreciate the time you took to read and help me out! 😀

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        • I’m truly grateful that you read this and left such wonderful input. It’s funny that you used the terms “hauntingly beautiful,” as that’s an intention I have with nearly everything I write. So, as you can imagine, it’s awesome to read those magic words from someone! As far as the rhyming, I attempted to structure it and get a solid pattern, but eventually it lost its essence. So, I just went with what felt right. I suppose that makes me a rebel? 😛
          Thanks again!

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    • Wow, your comment made my heart jump! It’s funny you mention that because I’ve been “writing” song lyrics since my elementary years. Though, I’ve never thought to do anything with them because, at least in my mind, I didn’t think they had any more potential than just lying around in a journal. I can’t tell you how deeply your kindness has touched me. Seriously, thanks so much! 🙂

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  8. Great job for your first time, Adelie. It had good rhythm as well as emotion.

    Just a few things:

    1) “soot, cover every square foot, of the walls”–get rid of the commas; they’re not needed and you don’t want pauses there.

    2) “hopes dimmed bleaker”–“dimmed” doesn’t seem the right word here. You just used “grew” so I’m not sure what would work. How about “hope became bleaker”, just leaving out “my.”

    3) “survived through both World Wars’–take out “through” and I”ll think you’ll see it flows better and means the same thing.

    Just my thoughts but again, congratulations on a taking a chance. It worked.

    janet

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    • Thanks for reading and for the helpful tips, Janet. It’s nice gaining a new perspective on my work. I took out those commas- I originally had them there as automatic regulators of the rhythm, I suppose. Looking at them now, I can definitely see they’re unnecessary. However, before you mentioned this, they were totally invisible to me! As far as the hopes dimming bleaker, I knew dimming was an odd verb to nestle in there, but I felt it fit more with the theme of the candle. So I kept that, but I changed “grew” to “fell” and took out “my.” I also took out “through.” After you mentioned that, I was surprised at how much better it flowed. This whole thing was a shaky experience for me, and I really appreciate you taking the time to leave such helpful input. Thanks, again!
      Adelie

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  9. Lovely piece. Time flows seamlessly through your words until you say survived both World Wars then the reader realizes HOW much time has passed and how long this poor creature has waited. Love this. Thank you for posting it.

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    • Thank you so much for the tremendously kind words. I thought adding the World Wars bit at the end gave it a bigger impact, so I’m glad you enjoyed it. I think I may have had war on the mind after reading Rochelle’s first! Thank you so much for brightening my day!

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  12. I agree 100% with an above comment that this made me hear a tune as a read it. You should dive into your old journals and share some of those lyrics your wrote down… 🙂 Also…on the same note (pun intended) – the rhythm was perfect. Good job!!

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    • Thank you so much for reading and for the encouragement, Jen! Thing is, those old “songs” (if you want to call them that) were basically lame love songs. When I look back on them, they’re just too cheesy to bear. However, should the inspiration strike me to write a ballad, I might consider sharing it. 🙂 Thanks for the pun. I always love a good pun!

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  13. Such a rhythmic poem with deep emotions. As some of the others have suggested you should consider song writing. I am sure you’ll do well there! Cheers 🙂

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  18. Hi Adelie
    Well done for going out of your comfort zone with this. I loved it. I especially liked the line ‘Wax bled to the floor.’ It’s tricky writing rhyming poetry within a 100 word limit, but you pulled it off.
    (Oh and I agree with Rochelle and Kent about the song!)

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    • Thank you so very much for the extremely kind words! I’ve been reading some amazing poetry lately, and although I don’t think I could ever be so talented, it’s quite fun to try! Who knows, maybe I will write a song for FF… and perform it for you all. I’m sure everyone could use a good laugh! 😀 Thanks again!

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    • I’m truly grateful for you reading this and for leaving such a thought-provoking comment. When soldiers lose their lives in the field, their loved ones lose their lives (at least part of them) as well. War…good for absolutely nothing.

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Every comment is artfully appreciated!